Everything Is Recorded assemble all star cast for 'Winter Solstice'

Sampha, Florence Welch and Georgia are just a few of the ten musicians on the improvised project

Everything Is Recorded, the music project spearheaded by producer and XL Recordings top exec, Richard Russell, has unveiled its latest release titled 'Winter Solstice'. It's the third part in its series of four fully improvised, seasonally themed works, with ten tracks sprawling across a multitude of genres.

Ten of contemporary music's finest musicians came together to work on 'Winter Solstice', including Mercury Prize winner Sampha, BRIT Award-winning singer-songwriter Florence Welch, and London producer and synth-pop artist Georgia. SAULT instrumentalist Jack Peñate and saxophonist Alabaster DePlume also feature in the line-up.

Recorded in one session in December 2023 at Russell's own Copper House Studio and mixed the following week, the collaborative work evokes stirring atmospheres. DePlume's saxophone riffs echo eerily alongside Welch's hauntingly distant vocals throughout as each song ebbs and flows, meandering and evolving. Tracks such as 'No Looking Back' pull together strands of sounds, such as Georgia's glitchy electronic splices and Sampha's soulful vocals and warming keys, to form cohesive entities entirely of their own. 'How Much Light Is Visible' features stunning vocal duets between Sampha and Welch while the opening track 'Sierra Kilo Yankee' hones in on a Brian Eno-esque, ambient feel.

The two previous releases in the four-part themed project ('Autumn Equinox' & 'Summer Solstice') have also included a number of XL Recordings' current artists and alumni such as multi-instrumentalist Laura Groves, actor and director Samantha Morton, as well as Gorillaz collaborator and singer-songwriter Roses Gabor and rising Swedish artist Stella Explorer.